Distribute Learnings, Not Links
It’s a running joke in my family that I (along with my brother) am a sucker for magic tricks.
I’m one of four children in my family –– I have 2 brothers and one sister –– and on many of our vacations as teenagers, me and my brother Matt would find ourselves in one of those trinket-filled stores along the boardwalks of Myrtle Beach or the Jersey shore.
On more than one occasion, there’d be a magician there. And towering over the room filled with young children would be my brother and I––hanging onto every word and movement of this dollar store magician.
We’d be transfixed. “Okayyy…but how did he do that??”
Before we left, we had to buy the book full of magic tricks this man was peddling. Every. Single. Time.
And while neither my brother nor I remember any of the tricks these days, here’s one thing I do know––I would own exactly zero books on magic tricks if we didn’t see the magic up close.
There is a lesson in distribution here…
Are you selling magic tricks? Or are you performing them?
The latter is actually the most effective way of ensuring the former.
Let’s explore…
If you pulled all of the links from your content promotions, what would you be left with?
Actually, better question — what would your audience be left with?
The best way to describe it would be content announcements.
"Hey, we created and published this thing. Come look!”
There’s nothing inherently inspiring, helpful, or valuable in that. There’s no magic.
And yet, this is how most brands approach content distribution––they announce content. They distribute links.
They invest time in creating, editing, and publishing. Then, they…
🛑 share the link on Twitter
🛑 share the link on LinkedIn
🛑 share the link across relevant subreddits
🛑 share the link in Facebook groups, Slack groups, etc.
🛑 drop the link in a newsletter roundup (of other links)
🛑 ask the entire team to share the link
That is what selling, not performing, magic tricks looks like.
Those magicians my brother and I saw? If they had a sign outside that said “Magic Tricks for sale!”, as I said earlier, I would own zero books on magic. None.
We see stuff like that all day. But bringing the magic tricks (the content) alive for everyone to see for themselves? That’s when you inspire action.
What does that mean for us? Don’t distribute content. Distribute the learnings and insights from the content instead. Show your audience the value.
Below are a few ways I think about doing this. Next time you’re promoting a piece of content, try using these examples to promote the learnings and insights from the content instead.
Share the recipe
Share what went into the creation of the content.
How was it written? How was it researched? Who was involved? How long did it take? What was the inspiration behind it?
People often get hungry when you describe the ingredients in a recipe––the same thing happens here.
You can get really crafty here and create intrigue and maybe even a bit of FOMO…
“We’ve spent the last 6 months researching [X]..”
“We wanted to learn more about how [X] does [Y]. So, we went out and spoke to 100 [ABCs], one-by-one, to answer the following questions…”
“Over the last 3 months, I and others on my team manually signed up for 250 free trials to learn how SaaS brands approach onboarding. That’s A LOT of free trials. Here’s the process for how we did it…”
In each of these examples, you’re sharing the behind-the-scenes and celebrating the work that went into creating something. By doing so, you leverage a form of reciprocity in your audience. They might be thinking, “They put a lot of work into this. I have to see what this is about.”
Share one takeaway + examples
Share one takeaway from the piece and expand on it by providing 1) further context, 2) examples of this takeaway in the wild, and 3) tips for how to implement this takeaway.
Rinse and repeat. If there are 5 distinct takeaways in a given blog post, podcast episode, video, etc., you have 5 distribution methods for promoting that one piece of content.
Once you realize this unlock, you can begin structuring the content in such a way that you know where the breakpoints are for these takeaways ahead of time. For example, maybe this helps you to refine your brand’s podcast episode structure to ensure you’re asking a set of specific questions to every guest. Then, you know that the guest’s answers to each of those questions will be separate takeaways, and therefore, content promotions.
Content distribution is as much about the structure of your content as it is about its promotion.
Share one data point + analysis
Share one data point (when applicable) from the piece and frame it so others know what it all means.
What does this say about the current state? What does this say about how things have changed? How will this impact our approach to the work going forward?
Data in and of itself can actually create more questions than it answers. So, framing any data collected in your content for your audience is an easy way to be helpful.
You can also use opportunities like this to turn the questioning back to your audience –– “what is your take on what this means?”
Share a roundup of takeaways
Similar to the “Takeaway Post” –– round up all of the most important takeaways from any blog post, podcast episode, video, etc., and highlight them in one longer-form post or thread.
There’s no magic in link distribution.
The learnings and insights you distribute are far more likely to be engaged with, shared, clicked, etc., over a simple link dump.
What would this look like in practice? For your next blog post or podcast episode (or any piece of content, really), instead of link dumping, try something like this:
publish a Twitter thread sharing 3-5 key learnings/insights from the post.
publish a LinkedIn post drilling down into one of those key learnings –– go deeper on what it means and how others can. apply it. Rinse and repeat for the other 2-5 learnings/insights from the post over several weeks.
Note: You can also apply this on Twitter, Reddit, etc. Since you're leaning into the learnings, and not the link, your "promotions" should be well received anywhere you post them.
repurpose either the Twitter thread or LinkedIn posts as an update to your blog subscribers.
record a video with commentary from a subject matter expert at your company discussing what these learnings mean. What are their reactions? Is there anything they’d add?
use the audio from the video mentioned above for a podcast episode. Add your own context before and after the SME’s clip in order to set up the subject.
These are just a few examples of proper distribution.
Have fun with it. Focus on the learnings, not the link. That's when the real magic happens.
Enjoy the rest of your day. Make good content –– we're all rooting for you.
- John
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